


Powerless

by merthurmagic025



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Ghosts, Pre-Canon, of sorts, ygraine POV, ygraine is a ghost
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-17
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26507104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merthurmagic025/pseuds/merthurmagic025
Summary: Ygraine liked to talk to Uther, although she knew he could not hear her. She liked to tell him how he had been respected for his justness and loved by his people. How he was careless to let himself fall from that esteem. How he was a cruel and terrible king. How she wished she could switch places with him, leaving her in a position of power and leaving him trapped between the worlds, unable to pass through the veil. How she hated that she was powerless to stop him.How it was his fault she was stuck here.--------Or, Ygraine is a ghost, watching hopelessly as Uther murders magic users in her name.
Comments: 9
Kudos: 43
Collections: Tavernfest Round 1: Ghosts and Hauntings





	Powerless

**Author's Note:**

> So this is loosely inspired by a Linking Park song lmao, I've had this idea for a fic since like 2014 and I just never wrote it until now! If you're familiar with the song, you might notice some lyrics lol. What can I say, I was an emo kid.
> 
> Also, I could not have done this without the help of Manders (colorofmymind here on ao3) who beta-ed/edited this and gave so many wonderful suggestions! Thank you!!

Ygraine walked down the halls briskly, on a mission to get to her son as soon as possible. She had heard little Arthur’s cries all the way from Uther’s chambers and immediately set out to comfort her child. When she finally reached the nursery, she saw a familiar face caring for the baby. Ida was a nursemaid that Arthur, and in turn Ygraine, had become particularly fond of in the past few months. She was always nurturing and kind, and she held little Arthur gently as she whispered stories of magic and witchcraft being used for good. Ygraine knew that Ida was risking her life to do this, and it made her all the more grateful. As she was watching Ida with Arthur, Ygraine could have sworn she saw her child looking at her. Of course, that was impossible. 

Ygraine had been dead since Arthur was born.

Confident that Arthur would be taken care of, Ygraine made her way back to Uther’s chambers. The king was stewing in his seat by the window, as he often did these days, a hardened shell of the man who had once ruled with his heart, for the most part. She remembered the early days of his courtship, and how enamored she had been by his kindness and generosity. He had brought her flowers that he had picked on his excursions to the borders, where he visited the outlying villages. Of course, he had always been quick to anger, and the kindness he showed during their courtship was partially a farce. She had learned this as his queen, when he became a different man as soon as they were wed; he was still sweet to her, but it was less frequent than it had been before. Despite his flaws, when looking back at the husk of the Uther she once knew, Ygraine remembered how she felt the first time she saw him like this: stricken at her husband’s sorrow, and guilty for being the cause of it. After all, they had loved each other, and if she had been in his place, she too would have become despondent. However, Uther’s despondency quickly progressed into rage and hatred for the force he blamed for Ygraine’s death: magic.

Ygraine had been confused when she first heard Uther mention magic as the cause of her death. She had known she was dying, she saw the crimson soaking through her bedclothes and the sheets as she bled out. But at the time, she had assumed it was unavoidable, just a terrible stroke of fate. After all, many women die in childbirth. It wasn’t until she came back as a ghost and started following Uther around that she heard him confess.

“I’m so sorry, my love,” he had cried on the first day he visited her grave. “I swear I didn’t know it would take you. I knew there would be a price, but I expected it to be some peasant, not my precious queen. Nimueh deceived me by not telling me. She knew it would be you, she must have. Magic… magic can never be trusted.”

Ygraine had listened compassionately at first, but she froze at the mention of a price. Uther had used magic to allow them to conceive, and magic demands a life for a life. That he would have been content had the life been that of a peasant did not surprise her; he had always been a man with cruel tendencies. Ygraine had thought she’d been having a positive impact on that aspect of him, but it appears that her death unleashed and strengthened the devil inside him.

The day Uther declared all practices of magic illegal on pain of death, the skies were prophetically dark and stormy. Ygraine wandered through the crowds gathered to hear their king speak, watching as faces drained of color and screams of terror rang out. She tried to help them, tried to tell them to leave, but no one could hear her or feel her touch. After that day, she stopped leaving the castle. She couldn’t stand to see her people suffer.

After that, she spent most of her time following Uther around. He was silent most of the time, a permanent expression of anger frozen on his face. Ygraine liked to talk to him. She liked to tell him how he had been respected for his justness and loved by his people. How he was careless to let himself fall from that esteem. How he was a cruel and terrible king. How she wished she could switch places with him, leaving her in a position of power and leaving him trapped between the worlds, unable to pass through the veil. How she hated that she was powerless to stop him. 

How it was his fault she was stuck here.

Many women die in childbirth. They all pass through the veil. Many people die in exchanges for life made by magic. They too pass through the veil. But Ygraine? Ygraine was stuck here, in limbo. Her death was tainted by Uther’s reaction to it. His genocidal rage damned her to an eternal uncertainty, existing neither in the mortal plane nor beyond the veil. 

A few months later, Ygraine heard Arthur’s cries again. She made her way to his nursery but did not see Ida. This was strange, as Ida was nearly always caring for Arthur by the time Ygraine made her way to him. Little Arthur was still crying, so Ygraine tried to stroke his head. Of course, her hand went right through, and she couldn’t feel his soft blonde hair. His cries did calm down though, as if he could sense her presence. She began talking to Arthur, telling him stories of Uther’s kindness when they were courting and of all the ways magic can save lives and make them brighter. She liked to do this frequently, hoping to counteract Uther’s influence on his beliefs on magic. After all, Arthur was the future king. The good of Camelot rested on his tiny shoulders.

When Ida still hadn’t appeared, Ygraine grew nervous. Leaving a sleeping Arthur behind, she went off in search of Uther and found him on the balcony overlooking the courtyard. Below, the citizens were assembled around a pyre. Tied to a stake in the middle of it all was Ida. 

Ygraine screamed with the lack of restraint of someone who would never be heard. The pyre was lit and Ida’s screams joined hers in a terrible, terrible harmony.

In the exact moment of Ida’s death, Ygraine felt a shockwave through the air. It caused her entire being to vibrate with pulsing energy. Gasping, she collapsed to the floor. As the energy dissipated, she was left with only a strong pull to the east, like something was calling to her.

And so it was that Ygraine found herself in the small village of Ealdor, just outside of Camelot. The pull had led her here, to a small house in the village. Inside, a woman was rocking a very small baby who couldn’t be more than a few days old. As Ygraine watched them, the child’s eyes flashed gold and the swaddling unwrapped itself so he could move his limbs freely. Now that Ygraine knew what she was looking for, she could feel the power radiating from this child. It was immense, stronger than many adult sorcerers she had known in life, and he was still only a baby; his power would certainly grow as he aged. 

Perhaps, Ygraine thought as she watched this magical little boy play with his mother’s fingers, there is hope yet for Camelot.


End file.
